About “Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down)”

This song captures the events that occurred during the Battle of Yorktown, the last major battle of the Revolutionary War. These events are covered in Chernow’s biography on pages 160-165.

Washington chose to concentrate his forces at Williamsburg. Once there, they joined with Lafayette’s forces who had been shadowing Cornwallis' movements. With the army assembled, Washington and Rochambeau began the march to Yorktown on September 28. Arriving outside the town later that day, the two commanders deployed their forces with the Americans on the right and the French on the left.

For three days, the Continental/French armies pounded the British lines around the clock. On the night of October 11, Washington’s men began work on a siege trench, just 250 yards from the British lines. Progress on this work could not continue due to British fortifications, Redoubts #9 and #10, which prevented the line from reaching the river. Assault on Redoubt #10 was assigned to our hero, Alexander Hamilton.

Washington’s tactics, as well as the actions of Hamilton, Lafayette, and Laurens, led to a full surrender by British Lt. General, Lord Cornwallis. The title refers to the song played by British bands as they marched out of town following Cornwallis' surrender.

Here is a photo of a plaque on the site:

Is this song reprised later in the show?

While there is no direct reprise, the chord progression of “Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down),” used through the majority of the song, will return the Act II song “Hurricane,” as Hamilton contemplates publishing the Reynolds Pamphlet. This musical connection between the two songs perhaps references how the battle of Yorktown was hectic like a hurricane, or how Hamilton’s later decision is the climactic moment of his political career, just like Yorktown was the climax of his military service.

The connection between “Yorktown” and “Hurricane” is also present in the staging of the show—both sequences contain a piece of choreography where the company members lift chairs and other furniture upside down in the air, moving in slow motion, which gives the illusion of a tornado-like upheaval—almost literally “the world turned upside down.” They’re poignant parallels and counterpoints to each other. In “Yorktown,” the world turning upside was a good thing, signaling the beginning of the end for the British rule, while in “Hurricane,” it’s Hamilton’s world turning upside down in the wake of his life’s worst disasters: the hurricane in his childhood and the Reynolds Pamphlet in adulthood.